Awesome! Thanks.
Looking at the chart for the tip of Point Loma, I think the public overlook just south of the old lighthouse is the best, and it does match to right about 400' or a bit more. Under 420' with tripod for sure. I feel like there ought to be a geodesic benchmark somewhere, but this is good enough.
That other "tower" on the chart is a fenced off facility for what looks like meteorological equipment and a microwave antenna or two. The public observations points are above the ground level where those are.
I looked around for other spots at 250' to maybe put Central Coronados in transit. I marked a few spots:
- The blue star is on a public path that goes down toward the bayside portion of the point, and if it weren't for that ridge I marked with a red line, it would be great.
- The green star is on federal property. I can get there, but I can't bring a camera. (Battery Humphreys is an old WW2 embattlement, used for other purposes now.)
- The orange star is on a public roadway that provides access to the windward coastal areas like the current lighthouse, tidepools and other federal facilities. There's no pull off area or stopping permitted. I think pedestrians are allowed on the shoulder to make the walk up/down the road, but not to stop and set up a tripod station. And there's no off road/trail hiking permitted. (Not fenced off, but posted.)
As an aside, I was shooed away from taking photos from
a vantage point further north from the tip. It's on federal property and not behind gates, but I was asked what I was doing and told that though I'm permitted access, I can't use my camera since it overlooks federal facilities. That's what led me to check out the end of Point Loma in the 1st place. That was a great location, close to where I work and comfortable (picnic tables, shade, parking within feet...it was perfect.) That had an elevation of about 400' also and I could see all of the Coronados, albeit adding around 2-3 miles to the distance and not affording any access close to sealevel.
I am allowed to take photos from the public pull off a few hundred meters north of that,
above the TRANSDEC pool, but I can't see the islands from there. It's still a good spot to view the horizon. When I've got my cube or my water level tubes set up on a tripod, I invariably have other motorists or cyclists stopping to ask what I'm doing. I probably should make up a poster board explaining. Even though I think this is proving to support a globe earth, the mere fact that it gives attention to a flat earth prospect has to be something The Flat Earth Society would appreciate.